Touhou: Homecoming of the Scarlet Stain
by ScarletVanguard
Summary: A Touhou fanfic featuring a OC of mine. My first actual novel, I hope it's not disappointing. No hints on the plot though xP
1. Stage 0: Not a tutorial level

_Who was that?_ Martin thought to himself, as he sat up in his bed. He had dreamt of a girl; she was fidgeting in a large bed, and had wavy, purple hair. The eyes that she opened were her most prominent feature though—the bright red color of them was still in his mind. Still, what puzzled Martin was how familiar the figure was to him. But there was no way he could have known her—the only girls he knew that he was close with were Renko Usami and Maribel Han. They were his closest friends—and to tell the truth, they were his only friends.

Martin turned to look at his clock and shot up, "12:43 already?" He exclaimed. "Damn it I'm going to be late!"

And in fact, when he woke, he was already 13 minutes late; late for a meeting with Renko and Maribel at the park. Martin took a quick shower and shot out of the door—his hand wildly shaking his dark blue hair around in the hopes that it would settle nicely.

"Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn!" he yelled, running as fast as he could. Luckily his room was on the bottom floor of the apartments, and he waved to the elderly landlord as he zoomed by. The landlord had found Martin passed out in the park four years before. She took him in, as he had nothing—no family, memories of his past, and no possessions except the clothes he was wearing. The landlord eventually became a sort of grandmother figure to Martin, letting him stay in a room, and helping to support him financially.

He was not even halfway to the park, when he had to stop to rest. While Martin was a fast runner, his unnaturally low endurance usually rendered his speed useless. When Martin finally reached the park, he was 43 minutes late of their arranged meeting time at 12:30. He spotted Renko and Maribel sitting on a bench under a tree. It was the middle of summer and the two were out of college for their summer break.

Martin had met the two while exploring the areas around Kyoto, where they all lived. Maribel and Renko were investigating a building that was recently reported to be haunted, when Martin decided to check the same structure out.

"Hey Renko, you think that was a ghost?" Maribel asked as Martin opened a door in a room close to where they were.

Renko thought. "Hmm…Maybe it was, but then again, there are other people who probably want to investigate this area too…"

Renko and Maribel walked over to exit the room they were in, stepping on a loose floorboard along the way. The creaking sound echoed through the building, setting off Martin's fear of ghosts. He sprinted through the building, knocking things over, finally catching the attention of Renko and Maribel. The two rushed out of the room, intent on capturing the source of the noise. All they could see was a shady, figure running from them.

"We've almost got the ghost, Renko!" Maribel yelled to her best friend, as Martin began to slow down. They were on the second floor of the building, and as Martin got ready to jump the stairs, he fell down them instead, landing with a thud. The two girls took gave one last burst of speed and took a look at their prey.

"Well, this isn't a ghost…" Maribel said, disappointed.

"Yep, looks like it _was_ just another explorer…" Renko announced, helping Martin up. "So, what's your name?"

"Martin" he answered

"So, Martin…" Renko began slowly, trying to get a hold of the character of the man in front of her. "Are you into ghosts?"

Martin's heart began to race, "G…G...Ghosts?" He stammered.  
>"Well that looks like a no." Maribel discerned. "But do you like supernatural or weird things? Because we're in a club for that sort of stuff…"<p>

In the years he was in high school, Martin was labeled a weirdo, and thus never had one acquaintance, and was disliked by everyone. So when he met Maribel and Renko, the three weird people struck an odd friendship started by a reluctant "Yeah…" from Martin.

"Well it took you a while to get here." Renko said as Martin walked over. "And as usual, your hair is all messy."

He was out of breath and was sweating "Sorry, there was a bit of a holdup"

Renko raised an eyebrow "Well from the looks of it, you got tired again from running here didn't you?"

"Uh, well….Hey, was Maribel up all night?" Martin said, quickly trying to change the subject. He took a seat next to Renko, who began fanning herself.

"That wasn't the smoothest topic change, but yeah, she was trying to set up our next club trip." Renko answered, looking over at the sleeping Maribel.

"And where are we going this time?" Martin asked. He wasn't sure if he wanted to know, but was curious about it too. A slight breeze blew, throwing Maribel's blonde hair over her face.

Renko gave a sigh of relief. "Some place that reportedly has a disease floating around that causes the inhabitants to become psychotic when under stress. I think it was called Hinazara or something."

"I don't think that sounds very safe" Martin declared. He decided to let them know about the weird dream he had that morning about the girl. He had nobody else to tell, anyway. But as he opened his mouth to tell them, a gust of wind came by, sending Maribel's hair fluttering, and Renko's hat flying to follow the wind.

Martin got up. "I'll get it." He said, waving Renko off. He ran to follow the hat, which kept going as the wind kept up for an unusual amount of time. The hat settled on the branch of a tree; he stopped and rested before trying to climb the tree though—following the hat was exhausting. After multiple, unproductive tries, Martin finally got a hold of the branch and pulled himself up.

He spotted Maribel and Renko who were quite a ways off, but he had taken too long and the thin branch snapped under his weight. Martin tried to grab the hat, but snatched air instead. As he fell, he caught a glimpse of the sleeping Maribel fidgeting on the bench, and Renko slowly turning her head to see what was taking so long. He waited for his feet to touch solid ground, but the expected impact was delayed—a portal opened like a zipper to a bag below him, and Martin landed on his side to darkness.

However, it was not absolute darkness—there were thin slivers of moonlight peeking through what looked to be…_A bamboo forest?_ Martin looked up from where he fell, and the portal was closing; the last thing he saw fromKyoto as the portal closed was a brim to a hat, and a white bow, slowly drifting down.


	2. Stage 1: House of rabbits

Tewi tensed up as something blocked the moonlight for a second and fell to earth. She heard the scuffling of feet—about twenty or so—along with the sharp crack of dried leaves and twigs. But she wasn't worried about the source of all that movement, despite how loud it was. It came from the rabbits—her folk—who accompanied her when she decided to take a stroll in the forest. All the noise began to die down however, and she took a look around. Tewi looked around—left, right, behind, left again. Her rabbit brethren had deserted her, probably in fear of the thing that fell from the sky. And now she was left alone at night in the Bamboo Forest of The Lost.

Tewi was split on following the other rabbits back to their home—Eientei—or checking out the source of what caused them to flee so hastily in the first place. It was basically a choice of if she was feeling cowardly or curious. Either choice was made more appealing by the fact that whatever fell was so odd in how it appeared, despite out of the ordinary occurrences happening every day. Eventually, curiosity won the best of her. She sprinted towards the site of where the thing landed, but bumped into something. Or someone. Someone wearing suspenders.

"Oh Mokou! Come to check out that thing that fell too?" Tewi asked, slowly getting up.

The girl named Mokou didn't turn to look at the rabbit girl, and her silence was enough to answer.

Tewi inched closer to the heap that was lying on the forest floor in front of them. "Alright then, so, who's gonna go check it out?"

"Tewi, stop. I will." Mokou finally answered in a hushed voice. She began to move closer too; the loud crunching of leaves caused her to stop, because it definitely did not come from her. She turned her head to where Tewi was standing, who much to her chagrin, but not very surprisingly, was gone.

Mokou returned her gaze to the thing that fell from the sky, which she made out to be a human. And that human was Martin. Tewi was standing right next to him, and Mokou decided to do something before she did anything hasty.

"Get back here, Tewi!" Mokou yelled. She had not intended for it to be, but her yell sounded angry and quite aggressive.

Tewi took that as a cue for her to leave, and she grabbed Martin's wrist and began to run.

Mokou stood up and began chasing after Tewi. "I said get back here!" Mokou yelled—this time her angry tone was intended.

Tewi sprinted as fast as she could towards Eientei, dragging the unconscious human behind her—outspeeding Mokou who was driven to catch the rabbit. This was in part due to Martin being such a light person, although he wasn't that large of a human anyway. Martin in the midst of this was drifting in and out of consciousness—the only things he could catch a glimpse of between the blurred vision and the night was the white on his captor, which would stick out to anyone in darkness.

Racing through Martin's mind was the question, _Who am I being pulled by? _But the thought of him falling from the sky a few minutes earlier never crossed his mind. The first thing he saw upon waking up—even if it was for a few seconds—were large white ears, the most distinguishing feature of a rabbit. The pair he saw was droopy, but nonetheless they belonged to a rabbit. Regaining consciousness a second time, he spotted something round, and fluffy; _No way, a rabbit's tail too? I'm being pulled by a rabbit? _He was skeptical about the idea, but somewhere in the back of his mind wanted to believe it was true. _I definitely must be dreaming_. He eventually decided, and he soon would be dreaming as Tewi dragged his head into a rock, knocking him out yet again.

Tewi's destination, Eientei, was a large, Japanese style mansion located deep within the Bamboo Forest of the Lost. It was home to people from the moon, and rabbits—many, many rabbits. And a certain female rabbit was tapping her foot outside by the entrance in annoyance. If one could listen past the monotonous clicking, they would have noticed that the rhythm was wildly inconsistent, and that she was actually tapping her black dress shoes in anxiety.

A woman appeared behind her, dressed in clothes that appeared to mirror the constellations of the summer night's sky. "The others still aren't back yet? It seems your already colossal workload is going to be doubled for tomorrow, Udonge." Udonge was the woman's nickname for the rabbit, who's real name was Reisen.

"Oh, Master Eirin!" Reisen said to the woman, trying to hide her dismay at the thought of more work. She already did most of the chores in Eientei, so arguing with the master would have been pointless and ended in some sort of punishment.

"I do hope you don't mind…Do you?" Eirin tested.

"No, not at all master!" Reisen correctly answered in the right tone. A bead of sweat and the slow increase in the speed she was tapping her foot seemed to show her true position on the matter.

Eirin ignored the signs and continued, "Well that's good, because you do know the punishments for if you fail, right?"

"Yes, master."

Their joking around—or at least, Eirin's one sided teasing—was brought to a halt by a soft noise that sounded like the rapid beating of a drum. The master and servant looked up to find a grey mass topped with white charging towards them. The mass was large enough that a small storm of leaves was trailing it as it rushed through the bamboo forest.

As she put her right hand up to her face, Reisen made it into the form of a gun, and took aim at the giant blob of grey and white. An almost pinkish orb of energy began forming at the tip of her index finger, with a red outline soon forming around the pink. She lined up her "sights"—her thumb, basically—with the center of the mass when it was close enough that she could make out some of its features. Suddenly, the energy dissipated, right as it was forming into the shape of a bullet. Reisen had definitely seen the features of the grey and white object—multiple faces, all topped with droopy rabbit ears. It was a mass, or rather, a horde, of rabbits.

Reisen breathed a sigh of relief and small tears of joy began filling her eyes. "They came back…I've been spared…"

The rabbits stopped at the entrance, staring up at the two women with confused looks as to why one of them was wiping tears from her eyes. "Oh, are you sure all of them have returned?" Eirin said, taking a quick glance at the group standing before her.

Reisen took a count of all the rabbits. All of them that had left earlier to take a walk had returned. She did a second count, as could not mess this up and lose one of them—she and Tewi were the leaders of the rabbits at Eientei after all….

"Tewi! Where did Tewi go?" Reisen questioned, finally realizing what Eirin had said about not all of the rabbits being present.

The group talked among themselves, until the rabbit whom Reisen had aimed at as they were running to Eientei spoke up.

"This thing fell from the sky and we got scared so we ran back here." She said. The rabbit was quite young, but she was around the same height as the others. "We thought Tewi was following us, but she might have gone to check it out…"

Reisen turned to Eirin. "Master, I'm going to-"

She stopped her sentence as her ears began twitching. They had picked up the sound of someone yelling. "Reisen! Oh Reisen!" Reisen turned to look at where the voice was emanating from in the dark bamboo forest. It quickly grew louder and louder until she could make out who the voice belonged to—it was undoubtedly Tewi's. And soon enough, out of the darkness she spotted the trademark white of Tewi that earned her the title 'White Rabbit of Good Fortune'.

"Well, looks like all of you are here." Reisen said with a sigh. "Alright, all of you go inside to your rooms." The rabbits all walked in, single file until only one was left standing outside.

"So you went to go check something out that fell from the sky, huh?" Reisen asked Tewi after all the other rabbits were gone.

Eirin noticed Tewi was grasping what appeared to be the sleeve to some type of clothing. As Tewi shifted her weight, a hand was revealed to be connected to the sleeve, and the sleeve was connected to the body of something. Human or not, whatever the arm belonged to was mostly obscured by Tewi's body. Before Tewi could answer Reisen's question, Eirin decided to bring the matter up.

"Tewi, that thing that fell from the sky…Does it happen to be what you're holding right now?" Eirin inquired.

Tewi looked surprised. She remembered that she had dragged Martin all the way with her to Eientei. He was not dead, but despite a faint pulse, he was hardly noticeable and she had forgotten about him. "Oh yeah! I found this guy passed out in the forest after he fell." She answered, pulling out Martin from behind her and laying him on the steps.

Eirin walked up to take a closer look. "Well, from what it looks like, he's just an ordinary human." She determined with a quick glance. "But we can't be sure about that, so we should be cautious for the time being."

Reisen had followed Eirin to examine Martin too, and she had her own thing to say about him. "He looks pretty beat up…"

Tewi recalled what Martin had looked like when she first saw him, then compared that image to what he looked like now after dragging him through the forest. He had already looked like that when she first saw him, and he had not landed on anything that would have caused much injury to his person.

Eirin had kneeled by Martin to examine him closer while the two rabbits were talking. "Well actually, apart from a few very small scratches, and bumps on his head," Tewi remembered dragging him into a rock "he is perfectly fine externally." The two rabbits looked at Eirin in surprise at her revelation. "Although, I probably will need to perform some further examinations." Besides being the master of Reisen, Eirin was a genius pharmacist, and thus could also act as a doctor.

"Could you bring him into the medical room?" Eirin asked, walking into the house.

Tewi immediately followed. "Well, you heard the master." She said lazily, walking by Reisen into the house. "He's actually surprisingly light."

Reisen grabbed Martin's arms and began dragging him up the stairs into Eientei. She raised her eyebrows as she climbed the stairs and reached the entrance with little effort. _Wow, he is really light_. She thought

Reisen pulled him through the doorway and into the hall. Another rabbit was next to the entrance, waiting to close the door. The rabbit closed it, and as she walked away the door was slammed open. Mokou was standing in the doorway, her hand on the frame. She didn't seem angry anymore, but was curious to know about what had happened to the human Tewi carried away.

The thump of footsteps was heard by everyone when a black haired girl dressed in pink sleepwear came running down one of the halls. "Whaa, you guys were causing such a commotion outside, and now you're slamming doors?" She questioned.

Reisen propped Martin up against the wall and ran by the side of the girl. "Princess! Sorry about all the noise, everything should be a lot more quiet now…"

"Oh well, this heat is too much to try and sleep comfortably anyway. Actually it's too hot to do anything…" The black haired girl said, closing her eyes in dismay. "Reisen could you bring a giant block of ice to my room?"

"I don't think that's the best solution, princess." Reisen replied with a sigh. "But…"

"Alright, thanks Reisen. I'll be in my room." The girl said, opening her eyes. She turned to return to her room, but spotted Mokou out of the corner of her eye waiting at the entrance. Likewise, Mokou had spotted her too.

A scowl formed on Mokou's face as her red eyes glared at the girl. "Kaguya…"


	3. Stage 2: Trial by Fire

"Oh Mokou, have you come to try to take me down?" Kaguya asked. She had looked drowsy until a moment ago, but now returned Mokou's cold stare with one of her own.

Mokou took her hand off the door frame and put them into her pockets. "Kaguya, where's your rabbit and that human she was dragging around?" She had completely ignored Kaguya's question, which irked the black haired girl. However, Kaguya had been a princess of the moon, so she showed no sign of annoyance as centuries of being one had given her a calm disposition.

"How rude of you Mokou…And after barging into my residence too!" Kaguya yelled—a few magical bullets followed the words towards Mokou.

Mokou stepped back out of the open door in order to dodge the bullets. The bullets had pushed her farther than expected though—she only realized this after her feet stepped on air and she fell down the stairs leading to the entrance.

Kaguya charged out to meet her eternal rival, literally flying over Mokou as a flame projectile was shot at her. Mokou quickly got on her feet, following the princess while evading a barrage of magic bullets. The two alternated between aerial and ground combat, effortlessly weaving through beautiful patterns of projectiles. They had been fighting almost daily for centuries so they knew each other's fighting styles, bullet patterns—it was all embedded in the other's mind.

Explosions of color appeared wherever they had been seconds earlier. The explosions varied in noise, color, and composition—from Kaguya's quiet white beams of energy to Mokou's loud flashes of fire.

All the noise brought Eirin out of her office. "Oh is Mokou here?" She asked passively—centuries of living with Kaguya had made her used to the constant fighting between the two. She spotted Reisen standing, staring out at the two combatants. Reisen had gotten somewhat used to the brawls, but was captivated as Mokou and Kaguya were fighting harder than usual.

"Udonge." Eirin started with a booming voice to get her servant's attention. "How long has it been since the two last fought?" Reisen faced her master—just hearing Eirin's voice at an average volume would have gotten her attention.

Reisen put a finger up to her lips in thought. "It's been almost two weeks now, master." Reisen answered.

"Oh has it really?" Eirin answered, surprised since the fighting between Kaguya and Mokou was an almost daily event. "Well it looks like they're releasing two weeks worth of anger for each other." She said, returning to her office. Before she could enter the door, a rabbit carrying some medical supplies ran by her into a room two doors down.

Eirin wondered what the rabbit was doing with the supplies, then she suddenly remembered. "Udonge! Where's that human that I was going to examine?" She called down the hall, poking her head out of the office. She spotted Martin laying in a heap on the wall, where Reisen had set him down. He had slid down the wall a bit, but was still out cold, not moving at all.

Reisen grabbed Martin, and began dragging him down the hall. She was walking rather awkwardly—she was dragging someone while trying to speed walk backwards after all. "I've got him, master!" She yelled. Eirin got out of her chair and joined Reisen as she walked by. They set Martin's unconscious body down on an examination table, and the rabbit who had been holding the medical supplies handed them to Eirin. The rabbit left and closed the door behind her, leaving Eirin and Reisen to do their work.

Outside, the battle between Kaguya and Mokou was nearing an end. The two were breathing heavily, and each had taken a fair amount of hits. Kaguya's nightwear was covered in dirt and scorch marks—the nightcap she had been wearing was nowhere to be found.

Kaguya wiped some sweat off her forehead with her sleeve. "Mokou, that annoying fire power of yours is just making to this heat even more unbearable."

"What are you going to do about it, _Princess?_" Mokou asked mockingly. Her eyes narrowed as she started building up a large amount of fire in her hands.

"I guess I'll have to kill you so everything will cool down a bit. The saying is 'Fight fire with fire' right?" Kaguya commented. She pulled out a piece of paper that had something written on it. Kaguya held the paper up and chanted, "Impossible Request 'Robe of Fire Rat'."

Overhead, their yelling had caught the attention of a witch. She was dressed in mostly black, and was out of Mokou and Kaguya's view. When the witch saw that the piece of paper Kaguya was holding was beginning to glow, she stopped to take a look at what was happening below her.

"How nostalgic, right Mokou?" Kaguya said coldly. Mokou scowled at Kaguya's words—suddenly a wall of red orbs of varying sizes appeared around Kaguya. The orbs rapidly fanned out from her, with Mokou already in the air ready to evade them. Mokou kept up the dodging for a while, dodging orbs left and right—the prolonged battle had taken its toll on her however and exhaustion kicked in. Her movements became slower, but the bullets kept up their relentless assault.

The red and white bow on top of Mokou's head turned fully red because of the light given off by the bullets—she had gotten herself surrounded and had no way for her to get out of the dreaded bullet pattern. She had lost.

The witch that was observing overhead realized what was happening and began to fly away. However, she couldn't help but continue to look at the scene as her broom carried her forward. "Looks like Mokou lost…But they were going all out this time, da ze~! I'll have to challenge Kaguya again sometime!" The witch decided, flying into the night sky.

The pattern dissipated and Mokou had disappeared with it. Kaguya headed back inside, finding her nightcap where she had taken off over Mokou. Before she entered, she tried to brush some dirt off her clothes. It didn't clean anything up though—her clothes were mostly scorched and what dirt was on them could only be removed with a thorough cleaning.

As she walked through the door, Kaguya found herself standing alone in a hall. Almost all the rabbits—including Tewi—were asleep, and she had no idea where Eirin and Reisen were. Kaguya started heading towards her room—she was exhausted and felt like now she could definitely get to sleep. But when she passed by the examination room, she heard the clang of some metal and glass. Kaguya opened the door and saw Eirin getting up with Reisen beside her holding a tray of medical tools.

Reisen was shocked at Kaguya's appearance. "Princess! Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, I'm fine." Kaguya said, weakly waving off her concerned pet.

"You've finished? So was it a definite win this time?" Eirin asked as Kaguya walked inside the room.

"I think I killed her…" Kaguya said, closing her eyes. "Unfortunately, it didn't change the fact that it's still hot. I'm exhausted and can't go to sleep because of it."

Eirin chuckled. "You're also quite messy."

Reisen put the tray she was holding down and sighed. "Well, I'll go get another set of clothes for the princess."

"Oh yes, and Udonge, could you also grab some sleep medicine from my office when you come back?" Eirin asked.

"Got it, master." Reisen nodded, then ran out of the door that was left open.

"So Eirin," Kaguya said, peering over at Martin. He was lying down with his hands at his sides in an unnatural position. "What's your diagnosis?"

"Well, he has no internal injuries. And other than a bump on his head and a few scratches, there are no other external injuries." Eirin's smile disappeared and she looked at Kaguya seriously. "But all that is beside the point—Kaguya, do you recall seeing this human anywhere?"

Kaguya didn't give it a second thought. "Definitely not. I haven't seen many people anyway."

Eirin thought for a second. "Well, does the name—" But she stopped as Reisen came in the room. She was holding onto a set of pink and white striped nightwear and in the other hand was a glass vial.

"Princess could you raise your hands? I'll dress you." Reisen told Kaguya. She put the vial down and got ready to take Kaguya's tattered clothes off. But despite the princess's claims that she was tired, some hidden energy entered her body and she started to playfully flail her arms around—perhaps it was the heat getting to her head, or maybe she was just in a playful mood. Reisen lowered her head and sighed "Princess…You're not really tired, are you? In that case…"

Eirin looked on amused as Reisen tried to wrestle with Kaguya to get her dressed. Eventually Kaguya's arms gave out and Reisen succeeded in changing her clothes. Reisen was breathing hard—Kaguya had put up a good fight and now she too was exhausted.

"It's a lot colder out here than in my room." Kaguya said slowly. "Maybe I'll just camp out in the hall tonight."

Reisen scratched her head. "Are you sure princess?"

"Of course! Reisen, pitch the tent!"

"Tent?" Reisen yelled. "You're literally going to camp out here?"

"Of course! I've gotten dirt on my clothes, now I'll finish the day off by sleeping in a tent."

Reisen looked away. "We just cleaned you up a few seconds ago…I'll go get a futon and some blankets then."

Kaguya picked up a small bottle next to Eirin and got ready to drink its shady contents in one gulp. "Alright, I'll just take this sleep medicine so I have no trouble falling asleep…" Before she could, Eirin snatched the bottle away from Kaguya and held up another one filled with a much more safe looking liquid.

"Wrong bottle, Kaguya." Eirin said, handing the bottle over to her friend.

Kaguya took the bottle and got ready to drink it like she was going to do with the other one. "Was it really? Thanks Eirin."

Reisen entered the examination room—her view obstructed by a futon and multiple grayish blankets draped over her head. She threw everything she was carrying down out in the hall just in time to see Kaguya tilt the bottle of sleep medicine, all the contents of it spilling into her mouth. Reisen was shocked and ran over to Kaguya—she grasped the girl's shoulders and started shaking her. Kaguya's cheeks were puffed up as she hadn't swallowed the sleep medicine yet.

"Princess, spit it out! You can't drink a whole bottle of sleep medicine!" Reisen warned—her hands were tempted to squeeze Kaguya's cheeks so she would spit the medicine out.

Kaguya swallowed, apparently not hearing what Reisen had to say. "What?" She questioned with a tilt of the head. Reisen was totally flabbergasted at her owner's carefree attitude towards the idea of overdosing on medicine. Then when Kaguya fell limp in her hands, Reisen began to panic.

"Princess!" She cried.

Eirin patted Reisen's back. "Oh don't worry Udonge, I would never put Kaguya's health at risk." Eirin said. "And you do have to remember, she is immortal after all…Do you mind putting her to bed, Udonge?" Eirin asked as she stepped out and began walking to her room.

When Eirin had left, Reisen set up a 'tent' in the hall for Kaguya using the blankets and a couple bamboo poles from the examination room, making it big enough to put the futon under. She carried the sleeping Kaguya out of the examination room and laid her out on the futon, still questioning if the immortal princess was really sleeping. Reisen let out one last sigh before heading to her own room to finally get some rest.


	4. Stage 3: Youkai and Ramen

Martin woke up the next morning, his head aching. _This isn't my house…_ He thought as he fell off the examination bed and staggered out of the room. Because he—as usual—wasn't paying attention, when he walked out, he caught his foot on Kaguya's tent and fell face down along with all the blankets on the cold ground. Whether it was do to fatigue or the sleep medicine, Kaguya wasn't affected at all by what fell on top of her—she was as conscious as Martin had been the night before.

Martin got up. The fall for some reason cleared his vision, but he still stumbled mindlessly through the halls of Eientei. He had no idea where he was going, or if he even was still dreaming. A girl with rabbit ears wearing a pink dress and carrot necklace passed him, and he had no choice but to follow her. It was Tewi.

Martin pondered whether he should open his mouth to talk to Tewi, who being a rabbit caused him to seriously consider that he was dreaming.

"Um…Hello?" He weakly called out to Tewi.

Tewi stopped, finally noticing that someone was following her for the past 30 seconds. "Oh, you're that guy that I kidnapped last night!"

"K..Kidnapped?" Martin stuttered. If Reisen was there, she would have fixed Tewi's wrong choice of words, and Martin would have not misunderstood. He shook his head to clear his thoughts, "Oh well anyway, I was wondering, am I dreaming?"

Tewi looked up. She was only a few inches shorter than Martin. "I have no idea. You want to test it out?"

"Uh, Alright…Can you hurt me in some sort of way?"

"Well, sure." Tewi immediately agreed without thinking twice. She pulled a fist back to her hips and crouched down.

"Wait, hold up, I was hoping for a little pinch or—"

But he couldn't say anything more—Tewi was already in the middle of the motion for an uppercut. "Rising! Rabbit! Fist!" She yelled as she contacted Martin's jaw, sending him flying backwards.

Martin held his jaw as he came into contact with the floor. The punch drove his bottom set of teeth into his upper lip, cutting it open.

Martin kneeled down, one hand over his mouth and the other holding his jaw. "I'm bleeding!" He yelled. Drops off blood were sliding into his open mouth.

Tewi bent over to take a look at the damage her perfectly placed uppercut had caused. "Wow, so this is the power of a mastered uppercut! But I've seen a lot worse than that little cut…" Tewi announced, remembering the time Kaguya took care of all the cutting while cooking dinner with Reisen one night. She rummaged through a pocket on her dress, and pulled out a pink handkerchief to offer to Martin.

Martin didn't take the handkerchief though. His eyes had a different, almost absent look to them, but his left eye had changed entirely—the dark brown iris had turned blood red. The coloring changed back to normal in a second and so did his senses. Martin graciously accepted the handkerchief from Tewi and he placed it under his cut lip.

Tewi stood straight and pointed to herself "Oh by the way, my name is Tewi Inaba." She said.

Martin only did what was polite and introduced himelf as well. "I..I'm Martin..." His voice was muffled by Tewi's handkerchief.

"You wanna tag along with Reisen to the human village?" Tewi asked.

Martin didn't know what else he could do. Now that he knew he was wide awake in some weird world, all he could do was follow along. "Um, sure, I guess…"

Martin followed Tewi through the halls of Eientei until Tewi could hear Eirin's voice. Tewi signaled for them to stop behind a wall, and she peered out at what was happening.

Reisen was standing near the entrance wearing a backpack. She was in charge of delivering medicine made by Eirin—the backpack was where she carried it all. "Well, looks you still have double the work today, since Tewi didn't show up." Eirin explained.

"Again…" Reisen said dissapointed. She took the backpack off her back and tested its weight. "But master, there's about the same amount of medicine in here as there usually is."

Eirin turned and signaled for a rabbit to open a door to some sort of storage room. "Well it wouldn't all fit in your backpack, so here's the rest of it." She revealed, pointing to a box inside the room. Reisen went to go retrieve it, finding that the box was deceptively heavy.

Reisen's jaw dropped when she failed to pick it up. "This is more like quadruple my usual load!" But she didn't say anything past that and began to drag the box to her destination—the human village.

When Reisen was out the entrance, Tewi ran out after her with Martin trailing behind. Eirin noticed the two and spoke up.

"Feeling much better?" She asked Martin.

Martin noticed the cross on her hat. "Oh, you must have been the one who fixed me up. Thank you." He quickly said with a bow. Martin ran out after Tewi, not wanting to be left behind.

A voice came from behind Eirin. "Eirin, has Reisen left already?" It was Kaguya and she was rubbing her eyes, not being fully awake yet.

"Yes she has. But about my question about that boy last night, does the name 'Scarlet' ring a bell?" Eirin crossed her arms, looking hopeful.

"The Scarlet family? Let me think…" Kaguya said. This was as far as she could think in her half awake state.

"Oh well." Eirin sighed. "Reisen set up some tea before we left, do you want some?"

Kaguya weakly lifted her arm and pointed towards the kitchen. "Lead the way."

Outside in the forest, Tewi and Martin were trying to quietly trail Reisen. Martin wasn't very good at sneaking, so he copied everything Tewi did, and with disastrous results. Tewi was rolling and sliding through the forest like a professional assassin—Martin attempted a roll and ran into a bamboo tree, and almost blew their cover on several on several occasions.

Reisen stopped at the entrance to the human village. She never got this tired when she went to the village, but then again she never had to bring along something as heavy as whatever was in the box. Using what strength she had left, she made one last effort to move the box inside the village and under a tree. The sun's position in the sky showed that it was almost lunchtime. Reisen took a seat on the box and organized her schedule for the rest of the day—she was already behind on deliveries.

Tewi came out behind her hiding spot and ran up to Reisen to poke her. "Hey there Reisen, it's almost lunchtime, huh?"

"Oh hey there Tewi…" Reisen said catching her breath. She suddenly sprang off the box and looked at Tewi. "Wait, Tewi? Where did you come from?"

"Oh we followed you all the way from Eientei."

Reisen grabbed Tewi by the shoulders. She looked agitated. "And you couldn't bother to help me carry this thing over here?" Reisen yelled. But then she let go of Tewi and looked around, puzzled. "Wait…We?"

Tewi pulled Martin out from behind a tree, pointing to him with her thumb. "Right, I brought Martin over here along."

"The human that you found last night huh…Hi, my name is Reisen." She introduced herself. "Wait, and he couldn't bother to help me either?" Reisen asked, giving Tewi another agitated look.

"Nope." Tewi answered bluntly.

"Ah, I could help you now if you'd like." Martin said, walking over to the box. He took a glance at Reisen as he passed by her. Peering into her crimson eyes, Martin suddenly felt a sort of nagging in his head. He stopped right where he was—his left eye began to turn scarlet again as he covered his right eye with his hand.

Tewi noticed that Martin was beginning to breathe hard. "Uh….Reisen?" She called out.

"What the…I could've sworn I kept everything at a normal wavelength..." Reisen murmured, grabbing Martin's head. She was the one to make eye contact that time, and Martin's personality and eye returned back to normal.

"Wh..What the hell was that…?" Martin asked, shaking.

Reisen let go of him. "Well, I have the power to cause insanity." She explained.

"Is that the furthest you're going to explain? That boy isn't from around here, is he?" A voice from behind the three caused them to turn their heads. A woman was standing before them wearing an all blue dress and carrying a book.

"Oh, Keine, I don't think I have any deliveries for you…" Reisen said, checking through her bag.

"That's my delivery over there." Keine revealed, pointing to the heavy box Tewi was now sitting on. "But really, if you're going to explain something to an outsider, you're going to have to be a little more thorough than that."

Reisen peered at Keine. "Was I supposed to explain all of Gensokyo's history?"

"Not exactly but…" Keine stopped, seeing Martin was a little lost in the conversation. "How rude of me, my name is Keine Kamishirasawa. I'm a teacher and guardian of this human village." She said, extending a hand out to Martin, which he took.

Tewi leaped off the box and began to walk away, hands behind her head. "Well I'm off to get some lunch. I feel a lecture coming on."

They watched her walk down the street to where all the restaurants were, then Keine continued. "I wasn't planning to lecture you, but I am going to give a brief explanation about where you are. You're in Gensokyo."

Before Keine could say any more, Martin took the chance to speak up. "Gensokyo is a world mostly of youkai—humanoid or not in appearance—where they coexist with humans. Both humans and youkai have magical powers and abilities, and they either choose to live peacefully, or fight in spectacular battles of magical power." He recited as if he were reading off a piece of paper.

Keine and Reisen were schocked.

"Why yes, that's correct. How did you know so much?" Keine questioned.

Martin remembered the countless times Renko and Maribel had explained the thought of such a world to him and he refused to believe it. Now he was glad he had at least listened.

"Well, I've had the idea beat into my head a few times." Martin explained.

Keine clapped her hands together. "Oh! Well since you have the basic concept down, maybe you would like to attend my classes here at the schoolhouse to learn more about Gensokyo?"

"I uh, I think I still have a bit of work to do around here…" Martin lied, trying to turn down the invitation politely—Reisen was standing behind Keine, giving him a look of disapproval about joining the class.

"Well you're free to come by the schoolhouse if you'd like to learn about anything." Keine said. She had been wanting to teach Gensokyo's history for a while, but had nobody to teach. "But could I ask you two to bring my package to my house?"

Reisen took one end of the box while Martin took the other. They followed Keine who had to stop and wait a few times for the two. Keine opened the door to her home—a simple house which was slightly larger, but not unlike the others in the village.

Martin and Reisen set the box down as gently as they could, but it still made a large thud when it hit the floor.

"So what's inside here anyway?" Reisen asked Keine. Both her and Martin wanted to know.

Keine closed the door to her home then joined the two waiting in her sitting room.

"Just some glassware and a five volume medical series that Eirin borrowed from me." Keine answered. She walked to her kitchen, coming back with a chef's knife in her hand. Reisen and Martin held their breath as Keine cut the box open—glassware and books couldn't have possibly made it that heavy. The flaps of the box flew open, and white, fluffy balls jumped out of the box.

Keine took one of the balls out of the box then took a bite out of it. "Eirin used mochi to cushion the glassware?"

Reisen looked less then happy. A rabbit's job every day at Eientei was to make mochi—recently part of their daily production had been stolen, and now she found where it had gone.

"No it wasn't the master who did that…" Reisen sighed. Kaguya probably had done it, but she couldn't bring herself to be mad at Eirin or the princess. "Oh no! I'm behind on my deliveries!" Reisen yelled. She ran out of Keine's house, and Martin followed—he didn't have enough time to bid farewell to Keine for him and Reisen.

Keine watched them walk out of her door, her arms crossed at their apparent rudeness.

Outside, Reisen read through her delivery list.

"Do you mind helping me deliver all this medicine?" She asked as she looked up from her list.

"Um, alright…" Martin said. He had nothing else to do for the time being. And it was the least he could do to repay Eirin—although, he didn't know her name.

He followed Reisen around the streets of the human villages, looking for all the recipients of Eirin's medicine. Reisen gave him descriptions of the people she was delivering to—they found them in restaurants, their houses, their businesses, and just walking on the street. When they were done, Reisen had basically given him a tour of the human village, and admitted that besides Keine, they hadn't run into anyone of great interest.

It was already about two hours after lunch, and Martin's stomach started to growl.

"Well, I guess I could treat you to lunch." Reisen said, reaching into the pocket of her short sleeved dress shirt. She pulled out nothing, then began to pat her person down, ultimately not finding what she was looking for—her wallet.

"Tewi…" Reisen mumbled. She looked quite irritated. "Follow me! I know where she is!" She commanded, marching towards a restaurant they had passed by earlier. They walked in, spotting a black haired girl in a pink dress, drinking a mug of beer.

"Tewi! Where's my wallet?" Reisen questioned as she walked towards Tewi, who was sitting at a table.

Tewi held up the wallet and answered while drinking—her voice was muffled by the beer. "Right here." The beer quickly disappeared, and she set the mug down next to another which was also empty.

Reisen snatched the wallet from Tewi's hands, and then began to quickly scan through its contents. "It's almost all gone…" She cried.

Tewi looked shocked. "But I got you guys some delicious ramen!" She announced as she pushed two bowls of ramen towards Reisen and Martin. She hoped it would cheer Reisen up.

"That's not the point!" Reisen explained with a false anger. She quickly grabbed a pair of chopsticks and began to eat. _This is pretty good_… Reisen thought. It had brought up her mood a little because she was hungry as well—surprisingly, despite often coming to the village, she had never gone to this restaurant.

"Wait a minute…" Reisen said, looking at the price board. "If you bought two ramens, and two beers…I should have more money than this." She glared again at Tewi.

Tewi brought out two mugs full of an amber liquid from beneath her. "Well, I got a ramen too, and got you guys beers."

"Well that explains it…" Reisen sighed.

They talked as they ate lunch, the conversation mainly consisting of questions from Martin.

"You guys are youkai right?" Martin asked when they were close to finishing.

"I guess you could say that. Rabbits naturally are magical, so we aren't exactly youkai." Reisen clarified.

"And she's from the moon, while I'm an earth rabbit." Tewi added.

Martin remembered Eirin from earlier that morning—not knowing her name, he decided to take the time to ask. "Um…Who was that lady this morning? The one with the half-blue, half-red dress?"

"That was Eirin Yagokoro, our master. She's a lunarian, a race of people from the moon." Reisen replied.

They kept talking for a little longer, the questions switching over to being about Martin and the world he came from. Reisen drank the last of her beer, and the three got up to leave.

"Thanks for the meal Tewi." Martin told her.

Tewi gave him a thumbs up and smiled. "Don't mention it!"

"She used my money!" Reisen reminded them with an irritated look.

Martin corrected himself. "Oh sorry Reisen, thanks for the meal."

"Well, we have one last delivery…" Reisen said, pulling her delivery list out.

Tewi blinked. "Where to?"

"The…Scarlet Devil Mansion." Reisen sounded uneasy.

Tewi smirked, hearing the nervous tone in Reisen's voice. "You're just scared of Sakuya, aren't you?" She teased.

"No…Well, lets get there before it turns dark."

They had spent longer than planed eating—and talking—as it was around four in the afternoon. Tewi having already paid for the meal with Reisen's money, they walked out of the restaurant, and out of the human village itself. They took a different path, the numerous bamboo trees suddenly replaced with trees that Martin could only wrongly name as oaks. The sun was starting to set, and the path eventually cleared out to show a large European styled mansion, bathed in an orange light.

"Welcome to the Scarlet Devil Mansion." Reisen announced, looking up at the structure.

They walked up to its gate, where a red haired girl in green Chinese styled clothing was taking a nap.

"She's the gatekeeper of the mansion, Hong Meiling." Reisen said. "She's not very good at it though." She looked over at Tewi, who was slowly tiptoeing to Meiling, with a paintbrush in her hand. Right as it was about to contact Meiling's face, Reisen took the brush away from Tewi.

"Oh man, she's in the perfect spot though, Reisen." Tewi whined, trying to grab the brush from her fellow rabbit.

Reisen poked Meiling to try to wake the guard up. "Exactly." She said to Tewi. Meiling refused wake up, so Reisen resorted to shaking her. Out of nowhere, Meiling threw her fist into the wall behind her, creating a crater slightly larger than her head. Startled, Reisen let go of her and took a step back.

The impact of the punch—not any of Reisen's attempts—seemed to wake Meiling up as her eyelids opened.

"Wh..Who's there?" Meiling asked drowsily, falling into a fighting stance.

"We..We're just here to deliver some medicine…" Reisen had a shake in her voice—she was a bit more cautious after seeing what Meiling had done to the wall.

"Well, why didn't you just say so?" Meiling said with a large smile, her grogginess suddenly gone. Reisen presented the last bottle in her bag to Meiling, but she didn't take it right away. Meiling was looking over Reisen's shoulder at Martin, who was busy examining the grandeur of the mansion.

_Could it be…? _Meiling thought as she picked a pebble up off the ground and held it in a clenched fist. "Hey could you come over here?" She called to Martin.

"Me?" Martin asked, pointing to himself.

Meiling nodded her head to make sure her point got across. "Yep." When Martin was standing right in front of her, she showed him her open palm, with the pebble resting on it. "Alright, take the pebble from my hand."

Reisen was puzzled at the randomness of the request. "What's with this so suddenly?" She inquired.

Martin took a second to analyze what she wanted him to do, another second to think over a plan to grab the pebble, then went for the actual grab. But his actual attempt was slow—Meling had already thrown the pebble behind her shoulder before Martin closed even half of the distance between them.

Meiling analyzed what she had seen. _Thinks things over too much, slow reflexes, weird in general…yep it's him_. "Well, thanks for the medicine." She said, taking the bottle from Reisen's outstretched hand. "Sakuya will probably bring the payment or something…And could I ask your friend to stay with us for a while?"

Reisen grew even more confused at Meiling's question. "I guess I could explain to master why he's gone…Wait a minute, I have a feeling that you guys are going to do something weird." Reisen said with a wary look.

"Nah, it's just a gut feeling I have about something."

"But you know, he's only been here for about two days."

"Oh?" Meiling raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean by here?"

"In Gensokyo. Apparently he's not from this world."

"Really? Well perfect!"

"I'm fine with it, as long as it's safe here…" Martin interrupted, the words spilling out of his mouth without him thinking about it. He was surprised at his response, and then suddenly looked to Reisen and Tewi, scared for any indication of how safe the mansion was.

"You'll be fine." Tewi told him. But Martin hesitated to do anything—Tewi's words for some reason hadn't been very reassuring. Reisen's look of uncertainty didn't help.

"Ok then…" Again, his reply was automatic. Something drew him to the mansion despite its ominous aura.

"Alright then! Follow me!" Meiling told him, opening the gate to the mansion. He led the way as Meiling stopped to close the gates.

Tewi and Reisen watched him walk inside the giant wooden doors of the mansion, then began their journey back to Eientei—the sun was almost below the horizon and they had to hurry.

Tewi hit her open palm with a fist. "Oh! That's right! I remember who that guy is now!"

"What? Really?" Reisen asked. She was absolutely clueless now—the weird interaction at the mansion and now Tewi's memory were all connected to Martin, and she wanted to know how they were. "What do you remember?"

As they passed into the familiar bamboo forest, everything was now dark, only being illuminated by the summer stars and the moon. Reminiscent of an old man, Tewi only answered Reisen with a, "You're too young to know, youngster."


	5. Stage 4: Little Devils

A/N: Such a short chapter typed over a period of long time...Shows how busy I am xD

I was planning to have this combined with the next chapter(when that will come out, I have no idea), but I was eager for a new release so I went ahead and just split them in two

I suppose that's it...please enjoy .

* * *

><p>Meiling took the lead as they walked through the large, dark wooden doors of the Scarlet Devil Mansion. Two small girls floating by the means of wings on their back in maid's uniforms were waiting by the doors to close them. Their task was delayed however as Martin stopped to examine the styling of the door. The two floating girls were growing impatient, but kept all words to themselves. Martin finally stepped into the mansion, and behind him the two people pulled on the gothic door handles. The doors closed quickly and with a large thud—the two girls were surprisingly strong for their size.<p>

"Who are they…?" Martin asked as he followed Meiling.

Meiling didn't turn her head as she continued walking towards the large staircase in front of them. "Oh, those are the staff. They're fairies."

Without another word, they climbed the grand staircase, and upon reaching the top, they crossed paths with a woman dressed in a maid's uniform. She was carrying a silver tea set on a silver tray, both of which matched the color of her hair and eyes. She stared down at Meiling and Martin, who had stopped two steps before the top of the stairs.  
>"Hm? Meiling? Your shift doesn't end for another hour." The maid said.<p>

Meiling brought out the vial that Reisen had given her and presented it to the maid. The light of the chandelier hanging above the staircase reflected off the vial as it exchanged hands, and off the tea set when the maid shifted her body to take the vial.

"Oh hey Sakuya. Yeah, the guys at Eientei just delivered the mistress's medicine though."  
>"I suppose I'll be bringing the payment then." Sakuya said, putting the vial on the silver tray. She switched her look to Martin, who had been shyly gazing at the two girls and proceeded to continue to marvel at the interior of the mansion.<br>"And who might this be?" Sakuya asked Meiling, who had begun to walk up toward the maid. And all the while, the tray had not moved an inch—Sakuya's arm continued to hold it without any apparent strain.

Meiling stood beside Sakuya as the two stared down at Martin, who returned them with an anxious look. Meiling leaned in and cupped her hands around Sakuya's ear, who had took the cue to lean in also—and yet, her arm that held the tray did not budge.

"Well, his name is Martin….So…" Meiling began whispering.  
>The maid's arm finally moved. "What?" Sakuya looked curiously at Meling then glanced at Martin. "Are you sure? You can't just assume that it's <em>him<em> and just extend an invite. You have done that before."  
>"I'm definitely sure this time!" Meiling announced, no longer whispering. She stood with her hands on her hips, exuding confidence. A group of the fairy staff stopped to stare at her, but quickly walked off without any surprise—Meiling's outbursts were rather common.<br>"Honestly, I told you, you can't just decide on a whim…" Sakuya trailed off, and then sighed. "We'll put him on a trail period then…"  
>Meiling's determination finally appeared to get through to Sakuya. However, that was not the truth, and something else had gotten Sakuya to change her position.<br>Sakuya sighed again. "Honestly though, I wouldn't have been so easy in letting him stay if I didn't say that he reminds me of him."  
>"Sakuya!" A voice called through the halls. The voice sounded like a congested girl—a second later, a sniffle confirmed that the caller was ill.<br>"Oh my, it seems that we've talked for too long, the mistress is starting to get impatient. Meiling, please bring our guest to an open room."  
>Martin blinked, and in an instant, Sakuya was gone. Meiling looked in the direction of the voice that had called the maid away. She stood, grinning, and then waved for Martin to follow her. He reluctantly climbed the stairs, suspicion building up at the mention of his name amid whispers, and now the girl who had mentioned his name was grinning. Meiling brought him to a hall opposite the one Sakuya had apparently gone into—the marble floor was reflecting the light of the lamps situated on the walls, making the hall rather bright, which otherwise it would not have been. As the two walked further into the hall, they drew the stares of a few of the fairy staff walking by, Martin becoming even more suspicious when they began to whisper amongst themselves.<br>Meiling stopped in front of a door, which was rather ornate when compared to the others in the hall which were by no means dull in appearance themselves. She turned the handle, but the door refused to move. _Another try…_ Meiling thought, turning the handle once more, but then gave it a powerful kick when it still did not budge, sending the door flying open to a screen of dust. She walked in, clearing the dust with her hand, only to realize that she had blown it into Martin's face when she heard the boy coughing from behind her.  
>"Well, this is your room…" Meiling began to say. "Sure it's a bit dusty, but it's one of the better rooms in the mansion." She had not sound very convincing, and Martin's face was a testament to that. However, looking past all the dust it was quite a large room, with an exquisite design—it was lacking furniture, with only a plain looking bed and a lone chair sitting in the same general corner.<br>"Um…Thank you." Martin said shyly.  
>Meiling gave him a thumbs up. "Yup, no problem!" She told him, starting to walk toward the door. She closed it, and Martin immediately jumped into the bed and hid in its sheets. Outside, Meiling heard Martin coughing from all the dust, which somehow even found itself under the blankets. She couldn't help but smile for the next morning's events as she walked toward her own quarters.<p>

* * *

><p>Martin was woken up by the rapid thuds of bone knocking on wood. In surprise, he jumped out of the bed, with the sheets still covering him, sending a cloud of dust into the air. Martin ran to the door, the white bed sheets still wrapped around one of his legs.<p>

The door gave a loud click as it was unlocked—Meiling's kick the night before had destroyed the latch of the door handle, leaving the lock above it the only thing keeping the door closed. Meiling was standing in the doorway, brimming with excitement for reasons unknown to Martin.

"Let's go, Sakuya has something for us to do!" Meiling called to Martin. She quickly began walking down the hallway, not taking the time to notice that Martin was not following her. The bed sheets had snared his feet, causing him to trip. When he finally freed himself, he threw his shoes on and ungracefully ran to the side of Meiling, with loud steps that echoed through the hall. A pair of two large double doors opened as Meiling and Martin passed them with the same sound of metal latches unlocking as heard at the front door.  
>A pale girl with long purple hair stood in the doorway, looking unhappily at the two, who in turn had stopped to look at her. She was carrying three stacked books, and was rather bothered by the abnormal volume of noise at such an early time of day.<br>"Meiling could you be any louder…? No wait, forget what I had just said. I stayed up all night to organize these books that the rabbits borrowed, and my head hurts because of a lack of sleep."

Meiling scratched the back of her head with a false look of embarrassment. "Sorry about that Patchouli…" She wasn't sure whether to be insulted anymore—she had heard the complaint too many times. "You sure Koakuma didn't do most of the work though?"

Patchouli had been standing in an awkward position, struggling to keep the stack of books up with her weak arms. But as her arms finally reached their limit, the books dropped to the floor. She stood stunned over her precious books, horrified at the possibility of damage caused by the fall. The books did not create much of a noise when they came into contact with the floor, but it was enough to get the attention of Patchouli's assistant, Koakuma, who came out of the library with a set of silver covered books resting in her arms.

"Well hey there Koakuma." Meiling greeted casually.  
>Koakuma drew her arms up as the books began to sag. "Hello Meiling."<p>

"So you've been helping Patchouli organize all the books Reisen borrowed?" The hall was empty except for the four; their voices rang fully through its confines.

"Yeah, but it's getting kind of boring, so I thought I would hide this limited edition set of histories."

Koakuma and Meiling simultaneously glanced at Patchouli, knowing that their voices would not reach her—Koakuma was relieved to know this was the case. They also saw Martin, who was picking up the fallen books with haste and then presented them timidly to Patchouli. Patchouli stared at Martin with bored, droopy eyes, but in fact she was rather interested in Martin and a sense of familiarity he had to her.

Martin interpreted the prolonged look differently and turned his head before any more blood rushed to his cheeks. He pushed the books into Patchouli's arms, throwing her into another awkward position then rushing to Meiling's side. Without saying another word, Patchouli headed inside the library and Koakuma raced past her, eager to play her prank.

Meiling peered into the library then started a slow walk into a run. "I guess we should get going too!"

Martin nodded as he struggled to follow Meiling. A figure of silver was waiting for them at the end of the hall.

"Was the library interesting, Martin?" Sakuya calmly said- she seemed not to mind about Martin and Meiling's late arrival, all the more reason for the two to be scared.


	6. Stage 5: Still DollVampire Night

Martin did not answer Sakuya's question for the simple fact that beside him, Meiling did not want to take any action. Meiling was aware that they had arrived quite late and thus she was just waiting for Sakyua to hint at any consequences. Anxiety built up in the two as the silver haired maid continued to stand in front of them, eyes closed and with a warm but unnerving smile plastered on her face. Somehow, Meiling's fear of consequence had made itself into Martin's mind, and scared that he would be punished for not speaking up, he talked.

"Um…Yeah, the library was interesting…" Martin said, not making eye contact with Sakuya, who had opened her eyes in curiosity of what the boy had to say.

"Well that's good," Sakuya said, Martin and Meiling walking towards her with caution, "Patchouli and Koakuma are quite the bookworms, aren't they?"

"So Sakuya, what did you call us here for?" Meiling said in a raised voice. A hint of bored excitement was present in her voice, one that rang through the halls. A hinge squeaked, acknowledging this excitement, and unknown to the three an annoyed Patchouli had peered through a slight crack of an open door. Sakuya shot Meiling a quick glance, the light of the chandelier reflecting off the maid's silver eyes. Meiling froze up without saying another word—it was a trained response.

"I suppose I should be getting to the point…" Sakuya sighed. "The mistress is almost fully recovered, and she would be awfully upset to find out that Marisa came around to 'borrow' something again."

"So we're stealing from the thief…" Meiling explained bluntly, upon inspection of Martin's puzzled face. She thought it would help him understand things a bit better, but in reality had not. Upon first seeing the mansion, a suspicion had already put itself inside Martin about the mansion. After one night of staying there—with all this talk about an absent mistress, and an examination of the people who resided there—his suspicions only strengthened. Particularly, the odd behavior of the people in the library had a large impact, although unknown to him, that's how Patchouli and Koakuma truly acted.

"Sakuya!" The same voice from the night before—with most traces of congestion gone—called. It was the voice of the person Sakuya had referred to as mistress, and due to Sakuya's own reasons it was a warning that Meiling and Martin were to be pushed of the mansion that instant. The attempt to get the two out began rather subtly, with Sakuya telling them, "Oh my, the mistress is awake; you two must get going before she notices anything." However, with a moment's hesitation—brought on as the two wondered why they were being pushed so hastily out of the house—came the sound of socks dragging on the marble floor.

The sound was unusually loud considering its source, and only became louder by the second. At one point, when it sounded like someone could have been pacing back and forward right behind their backs, Sakuya—failing to have them leave through talk—uncharacteristically pushed the lower backs of Meiling and Martin, sending the two flying down the stairs. While the gate guard effortlessly landed on her feet at the bottom of the stairs after a fancy flip, Martin had caught his footing on one of the steps for a split second before continuing his fall. He crossed his arms over his head in a futile attempt to stop death from taking him—the way he was falling, his head would be the first to touch the floor, no matter what was done.

But in an instant, the scenery around him had changed. His head had not come into contact with the ground—rather his feet were the things touching it. Martin thought he had felt his heart stop, and thought that it stopped because it believed that the body it inhabited was already gone. It began to beat again however, stopping again for a moment as a slight pressure was taken off Martin's back. He peered behind his shoulder, spotting the back of a head which was turned towards the top of the stairs. The headband of a maid—a common accessory in the mansion—topped a head of straight silver hair.

"Nice save!" Meiling complimented Sakuya, knowing exactly what the maid had done.

Sakuya did not respond, showing her preoccupation with the source of the footsteps as her eyes continued to scan the top of the stairs. The volume of the sound continued to increase in comparison to the time between steps, which was becoming smaller. The steps were a timer for Sakuya to push Martin and Meiling out, and her time was almost up. Once more she placed her hands on the backs of the two, but this time pushed them only hard enough so that they would slide across the polished marble floor. Two fairies—were not the same ones from the night before, although similar in appearance—had been waiting for them at the door. The doors opened quickly and fluidly, Sakuya not stopping once until they were out of the doors. And as if this entire event was planned, two more fairies were stationed at the gates outside the house. The gates opened with the ease that was seen with the doors, and again as a result, Sakuya did not stop moving once.

"W…What's..G..Going on?" Martin stammered, only now beginning to recover from the complete shock of what happened a few minutes before.

Ignoring Martin, Sakuya leaned in towards Meiling. "Meiling, please don't return without the Mistress's item…" The maid whispered, then leaning in a bit closer. "May I ask that you take your time with this mission?"

Understanding what the maid was telling her, Meiling placed her hand on Martin's shoulder. The action probably would have startled him, but it did not show as confusion covered his face like a mask. "Well let's get going!" Meiling said, giving Martin a nudge to get him moving. She motioned for the slow moving boy to follow her on one of the paths that led away from the great house.

Sakuya turned to head back inside the mansion, the smooth action of the entrances opening were now acting in reverse. She relaxed a little with the absence of the two, and the absence of the footsteps. Instead, a new sound emerged, the voice of a little girl sailing from the top of the staircase.

Red eyes peered down at Sakuya, noticing that the maids heart was beating slightly faster than usual. "Sakuya, was somebody at the door?"

"Ah, Mistress!" Sakuya said in fake surprise. "No, I was just asking Meiling to run an errand."

"Alright, s…so, I'm supposed to be dead right now." Martin began. He had collected his nerves enough to at least be able to contemplate what he was going to be told.

"So you know how people in Gensokyo have powers, right?" Meiling explained.  
>Martin kept his gaze fixed on the ground, but nodded for Meiling to continue. "Well, Sakuya just happens to control time and space. Yep, you would've died, but she stopped time and helped you land safely."<p>

"Th..then what's yours?"

"My power you mean?"

Martin nodded again.

"In addition to the general things youkai can do, I control what is known to some people as 'chi'" Meiling examined Martin's face, becoming a bit bothered at the possibility that he was thinking what a horrible ability she had compared to Sakuya's.

In the span of what Martin put at twenty minutes, the scene of the mansion on a lake had turned into a sea of trees. There was nothing to look at besides trees. "Well ok…But what are we doing exactly?" Martin asked.

"You already know that we're going to get one of the Mistress's items back. The thief's name is Marisa, she's always at the mansion. And it just so happens that she lives in this forest."

"Do you know where it is though?" The hard to follow dirt path was nonexistent under piles of underbrush.

"Sure thing." Meiling reassured the boy.

She had been there numerous times for the same reason they were going now. But after thirty minutes of wandering, it turned out to be a false reassurance. Then an hour passed. Meiling—positive that she knew where the house was located—shouted out seemingly random directions in one final attempt. The shouts came with confidence as Meiling believed her instinct was undeniably correct this time. And her instinct was correct—after a little more walking, it had told her to stop under an opening in the trees where the sun had made a perfect circle on the ground. Meiling looked like some child playing captain, squinting while scanning the area with a flat hand over her eyes to stop the sunlight from bothering her. And finally she spotted it, a small house that looked out of place in the forest.

Meiling began to run toward the house which was located behind a thin row of trees. "Well there it is! Looks like my instinct was finally right! The item is an odd looking mirror, alright?"

Martin attempted to follow her, but after an hour of constant walking, he was tired. He walked slowly and breathed hard, arriving behind the trees to find that Meiling was nowhere to be found. All alone, a high pitched squeak had sent Martin running to hide behind a tree. He peered around the tree, spotting two blonde girls emerging from the doorway of the house.

One blonde girl had a black witch's hat on, and was the first to speak. "Well gosh Alice, it didn't look like you were ever going to use it."

"And when did that ever give you the right to take it, Marisa?" The second girl said, waving around some sort of book. It was a softcover book with a blank cover, and the pages flapped around wildly.

"I wasn't really taking, it was more like borrowing, da ze." Marisa replied.

Martin's eyes widened at the mention of the name. This was definitely the house of the thief that Meiling was talking about. But he definitely couldn't just go and ask for the mirror back. He would have to interrupt the argument of two strangers in an unbelievably odd world, and risk getting in an argument himself.

"Borrowing? You didn't even ask. This is an extremely rare book on magic, you know." Alice waved the book even faster, its delicate pages at threat of flying out and the creases on the leather cover growing larger. Annoyance bit at her, making her forget what she had just said about the book.

"Hey hey, you're going to break it da ze! Ok look, how about you let me borrow it for a little while longer," Marisa turned to the inside of her house. The sounds of items crashing onto a floor rang out, Marisa finally emerging with an odd looking mirror in hand. "And I'll let you borrow this weird mirror I found."

Alice continued to wave the book, faster and faster. "You think this is equivalent to that ugly thing? What would I do with it anyway?" The flapping pages created a wind storm that shot her hair up and with one final swipe, not the pages but the whole book flew out of her hand, hitting the mirror on its odd looking glass frame. "Oh see what you made me do?"

The book carried the mirror over by a tree with the two items sliding down conveniently by Martin's feet upon hitting the ground. He questioned whether to take the mirror or not. It was an ugly looking thing, and raised the question of why the mistress of such a large mansion would want it. The people living in the mansion had given off a creepy aura however, and he wouldn't have been surprised if they came to kill him for failing his mission. In comparison, the two girls arguing did not seem to be willing to commit murder, though he could never be too sure.

The snap of a twig brought Martin back to his senses. Alice was coming to pick the two things up so a decision had to be made quick. The snap of another twig alarmed him, and he instinctively grabbed whatever was on the ground then began quickly walking away.

Alice stood over the spot where the mirror and book were, now just an outline of grass and leaves. "Hey, Marisa…" She waved for Marisa to come examine the area—help her understand where the items could have gone in the span of a few seconds.

"Yeah, what's up?"

"I definitely saw that book land over here…That's just great, you made me lose it."

Marisa looked up from the imprint on the ground, then put her hand on Alice's shoulder. "Oh you're worrying too much, I'll help you find it."

Alice shook off Marisa's hand just as her face began turn red. "Alright, it couldn't have gotten…" She stopped as her face was painted with a rainbow light, holding up her arm to block her face. Marisa saw this too, and they looked past the trees for the source. And under the opening in the trees they saw it—Martin was walking with the two items in his hand, the late morning light reflecting off the glass frame.

"Who is that…?" Alice asked, stepping forward.

Out of nowhere, Marisa leaped over Alice, startling the girl. "I don't know, but he's got our stuff! I'll get him da ze!" A broom drifted into Marisa's hand, and in one motion she jumped on it and went straight for Martin.

Still exhausted, Martin had been walking the whole time. Hearing Marisa's yelling had gotten him anxious, but when he saw her speeding towards him he began running—the time for resting was over.

Alice watched Marisa speed off, shaking her head at her friend's energy. She snapped and out from behind her dress floated out three dolls, all clothed in a style similar to Alice's own blue dress. The dolls were of her own creation, and thus were under her control. Alice stretched her arm out like an army commander, and the dolls took to the air in a planned formation—she did not trust Marisa fully with the task of catching Martin.

The dolls went quick—they had already caught up with Marisa in a matter of seconds. "Well hey there! Alice doesn't trust me huh?" Marisa said to a doll without looking at it. "Alright then, split formation da ze!" The four split all in different directions, thought they were all looking to surround the same target.

A doll sped past Martin, at first it looked like it didn't see him; it stopped suddenly and cut down a tree, blocking off Martin's path, who could then do nothing else but trip on the downed tree's branch. He was surrounded now—the other two dolls and Marisa were coming in from his left, his right, behind him. He covered his head with his arms then went into a fetal position.

Martin began to mumble, "T…These girls, maybe they will kill me after all." He continued to mumble, all the while the four continued to come closer. "N..No!" Martin yelled as his head shot up. His eyes were glowing. They were still black, but glowed with a bluish tint. As he looked around, he saw that the four girls had come to a stop.

"Woah no way, did that guy just disappear?" Marisa asked. She jumped off her broom, then walked over to where she had seen Martin. Marisa was absolutely baffled, she had definitely seen him right there. She looked at the faces of the dolls around her, wanting to see puzzled expressions just as hers to affirm what she had seen, or rather did not see. However, she knew the dolls would not make such exaggerated expressions as humans did, and their confused blinking was enough.

Marisa was dangerously close to Martin, apparently not seeing him. Or rather, she could not. Martin backed up slowly, away from the four, his heart beating fast. He got this far without getting caught, he could not let the crunch of a single leaf ruin everything. Then he stopped, his heart beat even faster. Marisa was kneeling down, reaching toward him. Her black skirt and white apron had rested on his foot, although he was relieved to know that she had not noticed. Her hand came closer to him, and he closed his eyes. But again, it seemed she could not see him. Marisa's hand grabbed the 'rare book' which Martin had taken by accident.

Finding no other explanation for what happened, Marisa stood up and boarded her broom. The dolls flew up beside her; She tossed the book to one of them, who caught it but nearly toppled over in the process.

"Well, I guess all that matters is that we got the book…Well let's get that back to Alice."

Martin exhaled as the four flew away. He had been holding his breath the entire time, and with its release the bluish tint in his eyes dissipated. The exhaustion finally catching up with him, Martin passed out.

Martin was shaken awake to a view of the nighttime sky and a particularly large bronze star. His eyes focused, seeing that the star was not part of the sky, but part of a hat. A Chinese style hat on a red haired, Chinese girl.

"Well there you are." Meiling told the groggy boy.

"Wha..what?" Martin said, holding his head. Dirt and vegetation covered his head, a fair amount of it falling off when he sat up. His body hurt and dirt even found its way inside his mouth. All of that was the result of eight hours laying passed out on the forest floor.

Meiling helped Martin stand up. "Yeah, I've been looking for you all day. Where did you run off to?" The question was asked to and from the wrong person. Meiling had been the one who ran off, fulfilling Sakuya's request of taking their time with the mission. She did not abandon Martin, she only hid, lazily monitoring him from the top of a tree. When Martin passed out, she took a nap.

"I uh, ran into Marisa…" Martin reached under the fallen tree beside him, bringing out a slightly chipped mirror.

"Hey, you actually got it, nice work!" Meiling took the mirror and brushed some dirt off the surface. "Well, let's get back to the mansion before all the bad youkai come out." Meiling explained, putting the mirror away and leading the way back to the mansion—this time sticking strictly to a path.

At the mansion the fairies that had stood at the gate were gone, but nevertheless Meiling opened the gate with ease. She looked up at the balcony over the two great doors and nodded at what looked to be the silhouettes of three people.

Meiling split away from Martin and started heading toward the house. She saw Martin standing without a clue of what to do next, and put her hands on her hips. "I'm just going to check on the gardens, go ahead and go inside." Meiling said.

"I can take the mirror to Sakuya if you want." Martin offered.

"Nah that's alright, I can't let this break even the tiniest bit more than it already has."

"A..Alright then." He looked around nervously. "Um…Good night Meiling." He turned to say it to the gate guard, but he found himself talking to the dark and some flowers. Martin walked to the doors of the house, which suddenly swung open. There was an absence of fairies at that entrance too, and only a single, short figure stood there. Red eyes pierced through the darkness, placed on a pale face which reflected the moonlight. In a flash there was more red, and pain. Five scratches appeared instantaneously on Martin's chest, from which a thick scarlet liquid spilled. He fell, and found himself being caught by that pale girl. Then came another pain on his neck—a quick small one—and then the quick rushing of something through his veins. Blood had soaked into his clothes, turning them black in the nighttime, while the girl's simple purple dress remained without one stain. He was left to fall again, now finding himself this time at the foot of the pale girl, the mistress of the mansion, the 'Scarlet Devil'—Remilia Scarlet.

"At the loss of the human blood, inject with the blood of a pure vampire." Remilia recited. "You're pretty useless in that form, but then again I never really liked it much…"

Martin wiped his blood covered hand over the left side of his face. As his hand slid down, it revealed his left eye—scarlet. It blended in nicely with the blood caked around it, as opposed to the right one which remained black.

"You're working first thing tomorrow, little brother."

"It looks like you're feeling better now, Remilia."


End file.
